


I was never afraid of the dark (until you)

by KallistoKrow



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Blood and Injury, Briarwood Arc, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Vax is a little shit who takes over the plot even when it's not his pov, first CR fic, hinted anxiety attacks, not much, set right after Crimson Diplomacy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-26
Updated: 2017-10-26
Packaged: 2019-01-23 17:50:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,683
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12512880
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KallistoKrow/pseuds/KallistoKrow
Summary: Percy takes care of Vax after the Briarwoods nearly kill him. Fluffyangst. That's a thing, right?





	I was never afraid of the dark (until you)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Oakyboo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Oakyboo/gifts).



> So I guess I'm doing Perc'ildan fics now that Critical Role has taken over my life. If anyone has ideas and they like this fic, please send them over or come yell at me on Tumblr.  
> Title is taken from Afraid of the Dark by Phildel.  
> Inspired by a piece of art by AgentOklahoma, please go send kudos: http://agentoakysart.tumblr.com/post/164569578054/for-kallistothekrow-why-you-gotta-hurt-me-like

Percy’s hands are shaking. It’s hardly the first time. But it’s been a very long time since it’s been this bad.

Ripley. They had shaken like this with Ripley.

He drops the copper wire he’s been trying to reattach to Diplomacy before he can stab himself with the end again. Something he’s managed to do several times already.

He wonders if he’s going to break down like this every time he’s sees one of them. Ripley, the Briarwoods, Stonefell, Anders.

 _Or maybe_ , a voice in his head hisses, _it will be every time you fail to save them. Poor little Cassandra on the ground. Three arrows through her chest and pleading for her big brother. Do you think that pretty elf of yours would have pleaded like her when-_

“SHUT UP!”

Percy isn’t aware of standing until he hears the crash of his chair hitting the ground. He’s breathing hard, pulse pounding in his ears, drowning out the lingering echo of his own voice in the dim workshop.

“Shut up,” he whispers.

No one answers. Not this time at least. It doesn't matter though. Their faces are there behind his eyes again. Their screams pulsing in his ears. His father, his mother, Julius, Vesper, Oliver, all of them, Vax- _No!_

He wrenched his mind away from that train of thought forcefully. No. Vax was alive. All of Vox Machina was alive. His family _was_ alive.

Because that's what they had become, hadn't they? Almost without him noticing. They had carved themselves in around him. Embedding themselves under his skin like so much shrapnel. He found himself falling into old habits. Allowing himself to return Scanlan’s teasing, Keyleth’s gentle affection, Pike’s warmth. He’d allowed himself to care.

And now there was every chance that all of that would be taken away yet again. Because of him. _He_ had brought them into this.

He knew that he’d had little choice. They would have tried to help him whether or not he asked. Even if he had left, snuck away in the night. They would have found him. The twins would have tracked him, or one of the others would have found him with magic. Stubbornness was a trait shared by all of Vox Machina’s members.

Even so, the image of Vax vulnerable on the ground with Silas Briarwood leaning over him, it was almost more then Percy could stand.

It was strange; the whole evening his anger had been a simmering cold rage. Powerful, but oddly steady. In the instant that he saw the half-elf however, it had scorched into him in an uncontained, white-hot fury. Mixing dangerously with the flashpoint fear when Vax had made no reply to Vex after his initial warning.

Percy became aware that he was finding it very hard to draw a full breath. He had stripped down to his shirtsleeves before he had even entered the workshop but but his throat felt oddly constricted as if his cravat was still wrapped too tightly. The air in the workshop was a warm, oppressive haze. He needs air. Even if just for a few moments. _He needs somewhere with air._

Logically he knows the the the air in the workshop is fine, that he’s worked under far worse conditions than this, but experience tells him it won’t matter. It probably won’t matter once he gets outside. Because it’s not the air that’s causing his breath the catch painfully in his throat. It’s not the heat that’s making his chest feel like there’s a vice slowly being tightened around it.

Fumbling with the door, he eventually manages to get it open and step out, hardly bothering to close it behind him. Rounding the corner that leads to the stairs, he very deliberately does not look towards the cell currently holding their prisoner. His rage had cooled enough that he could feel the indistinct tendrils of shame at the edge of his mind. He pauses as he reaches the first floor.

The halls of Grayskull are usually dim after everyone but the night shift has gone to bed. Only the occasional wall sconces kept lit. However there is light spilling out from the door to the kitchen. Odd, Laina would have gone to bed long ago and the guards on the night shift were on high alert on the walls.

Percy crept the short distance down the hall. Most likely it was Grog grabbing a midnight snack and not one of the Briarwoods men who’d decided he was feeling peckish before murdering them in their sleep. Still, he suddenly wished he hadn’t left the List downstairs.

Reaching the door he paused, listening. At first there was nothing then… a clink, a clatter, then sounds of someone swearing softly. Percy let out a breath and pushed the door open the rest of the way.

“Vax? What the hell are you doing?”

Vax’ildan was half crouched on top of one the kitchen counters, a large mug clutched in his hands, and looking for all the world like a rather alarmed squirrel interrupted in its meal.

“Felt like I needed something warm,” Vax muttered, glancing at the smaller hearth.

Percy follows his gaze and sees the kettle hanging above the flames, heating.

“You know Laina will have your hide if she finds out you’ve have your feet on her counters,” Percy comments, wandering further into the room. “What are doing up there anyway?”

Vax scowled. Waving one hand vaguely upward, he shrugged and grumbled something about the top shelf.

Percy bit his lip, holding back a smirk with difficulty. Vax wasn’t short, but apparently those few extra inches did make a difference when it came to getting his favorite mug.

Some amusement must have shown in his face because Vax flipped him off as he sprang down from the counter. As he turned and started sorting through the teas Keyleth and Tiberius had collected when they had returned to the completed keep, Percy’s eye was caught by a flash of red.

“Vax.”

“Look, not all of can be freakishly tall sma-“

“Vax,” he said, more sharply, stepping in next to the half-elf and catching his shoulder. “You’re bleeding.”

Vax blinked, startled. He reached up to touch his neck and frowned when his fingers came away sticky.

“Damn. I didn’t realize I’d reopened it.”

Without realizing what he was doing, Percy found himself cupping the side of his friend’s neck gently. Tilting his chin to get a better look the wound. The marks looked clean and the redness had faded but he can see why they were have trouble closing. One edge was jagged with faint scraps leading toward his shoulder from when Vax must have torn himself free from Lord Briarwood. Percy felt his gut clench painfully at the thought and felt a faint tremor go through his hands again.

“Percy?” He swallowed.

“Do you… do you still have any of those herbs the cleric gave us?”

“A bit. I think Keyleth took most of them.” Vax was studying the other man’s face intently.

Percy nodded jerkily and turned to grab a clean towel from a small basket in one corner. Rinsing off his hand, he dampened the towel as well. He looked back up to see that Vax had removed the kettle from the heat and placed a small handful of dried plant material beside it, one hand still raised to staunch the blood.

“Let me?” He gestured awkwardly with the cloth.

Vax raised an eyebrow but gave a slight nod then moved to sit back on the counter. He was taller then Percy like this but it gave him a better view of the other man’s throat.

“You don’t usually play nursemaid, Perce.” Vax commented as Percy began to carefully wipe away the blood that had pooled at the half-elf’s collarbone, before pressing it to the wound as he reached for the herbs.

“I’d _like_ to think I’m not normally the cause of said injuries,” he answered flatly. “And I’m not Pike.”

“No, you’re not Pike, and you’re not the one who gave me these either.” Vax’s voice was quiet but it had sharpened subtly. Taken an edge like one of the elf’s many knives. Percy found himself wondering at whom it was pointed.

“You didn’t ask me to go into that damn room.”

“No, that was stupid by the way, but I did ask you for help and you wouldn’t have-“

“Bullshit,” Vax interrupted. “As I seem to recall you didn’t ask for our help. We told you that you weren’t going in there without us.” He paused as Percy lifted the cloth to apply the crushed herbs, the warm, green scent permeating the air.

Vax seems to be steeling himself, choosing his words with deliberate care. “You have been there for all of us, Percival. You couldn’t have expected us to just let you face this alone.” Percy blinks, giving the half-elf a questioning look. “You helped us save Grog when you didn’t even know us, you’ve always supported us in any way you could, you’ve been nothing but generous with your skills, and… and when I fuck up, I know the next thing I hear is going to you blasting away some poor bastard while calling me and idiot.”

Vax’s dark eyes almost seem to glow in the firelight. Percy realized in that moment how very close they are to each other. He can almost feel the faint stirrings of air from the other man’s breath.

He swallows, trying to unstick his suddenly dry throat, “You give me far more credit for my actions than I deserve.”

“Do I?” Vax’s voice is a low breathe, hardly above a whisper. Percy swears he sees the half-elf’s eyes flicker down to his mouth before meeting his eyes again.

“Would you take them back?”

Percy can feel the heat of his breathe, can almost feel the warmth given off by his skin. It’s like he’s back down in his workshop. Surrounded by heat and unable to breath, but this time he can’t bring himself to draw away.

“If you could go back, would you leave us in Stilben? Or when things started getting ugly? Would you leave me behind down in the underdark and save yourself?”

“No,” Percy’s voice is so hoarse he barely recognizes it.

“No,” Vax murmurs.

His mouth barely brushes Percy’s. It’s not a real kiss. Even the press of Vax’s lips against his cheek in the Illithid city was less ephemeral than this brief brush of skin but it burns his flesh, down deep into his bones.

“So… what are you going to do about it, Percival?” There is a challenge in Vax’s eyes, deliberate as the way he almost hisses out his name.

As with most of the stupid decisions Percy has ever made, the challenge is what breaks him. What pushes him over the edge to the point of no return. His right hand, still on Vax’s neck, tightens slightly while his left grabs for the front of the man’s shirt and pulls him forward into a kiss.

Percy doesn’t know how long it’s been since he last kissed someone. Not since before the Briarwoods anyway. It hadn’t been like this though. There’s no shyness or hesitancy in way they touch. For all that Percy knows that this is a truly horrible idea, there is no doubt in his mind that he _wants_ Vax.

A sentiment that is clearly reciprocated because in the instant Percy had pressed them together, the other man was already moving. One hand was tangled in Percy’s pale hair, nails scraping across his scalp in a way that made him groan. It isn’t perfect, they scrabble at each other’s clothes and their teeth knock awkwardly as they come together but he honestly prefers it that way. It’s raw and it’s real. And right now he needs real.

Vax’s hand tightens in his hair as he pulls Percy away briefly, moving quickly to bracket his hips with legs before yanking him back in.

He has no idea how long this continues, at some point Percy finally lets go of the towel, his fingers moving eagerly to twine into the half-elf’s long hair and Vax moves to Percy’s throat. Licking and biting his way over the skin in a way that makes him feel distinctly lightheaded. He chokes out something that might be Vax’s name or might be just some wordless plea but it succeeds in getting his attention.

Vax raises one hand and straightens Percy's glasses, which have slipped to one side and gently brushes back a strand of hair before cupping his face. The next kiss moves into the realms of something softer, and much more dangerous. Tenderness is something that can’t be as easily brushed aside or ignored as lust. It’s not an itch that can just be scratched, moved on from and maybe laughed about years later.

“Come to bed with me?” Vax’s voice is soft against his skin and he can feel his heart stutter in his chest.

“I-“

“Just to sleep,” Vax smiles faintly. “As much as I’d enjoy continuing, I don’t think either of us could manage anything too impressive tonight and I’m having a hard time remembering when I last saw you without shadows under your eyes.”

Percy feels himself flush. He’s not wrong and now that he’s brought it up Percy is starting to feel how truly exhausted he is. Vax looks rather worn as well though no less lovely for it. Well, he’s already in over his head, not taking the dive at this point wouldn’t fix anything .

“Do you still want tea?”

Vax snorts. “No Percy, I don’t want the damn tea.” A sly grin spreads over his face but before he could say anything else Percy kisses him again.

He can’t help but feel a little smug at the half-elf’s dazed expression. “Don’t ruin the moment.”

“Prick,” Vax chides, but without much rancor. He slides down off the counter and checks the bite on his neck. Luckily it seems to have clotted and he carefully brushes away a few bits of leaf that had stuck to the skin. “Come on.”

Their hands twine as the two of them sneak upstairs, past Scanlan and Grog’s rooms to Vax’s. Closing the door behind Percy feels Vax’s hand slide up his chest to finger the buttons of his shirt.

“Up to you.”

Percy swallows. Vax has seen him without his shirt on before. Living and traveling together leaves little room for modesty for any of them but the intimacy of the setting is very different from being out on the road. He hesitates then gives a slight nod and represses a shiver that has nothing to do with the coolness of the room as he feels steady, competent fingers working open the buttons. Once it’s off, Vax turns to lay it across a chair then pulls his own over his head and reaches up to release his hair from the half up it was still pulled back in. Percy can’t help but stare as he clumsily removes his boots and his glasses. Catching his eye Vax smirks but doesn’t call him out. Instead he leads him over to the bed and pulls him in under the blankets.

The texture of his skin is subtly different than that of a human’s but he can feel the faint traceries of scars under his fingers. One in particular catches his attention, a raised almost geometric pattern on the half-elf’s back. Vax tenses slightly as he explores it so Percy is quick to move his hand away, pressing his lips into the other man’s hair in silent apology. Scars aren't a subject either of them wants to raise tonight.

“Wake me before you sneak back to the workshop in the morning.”

Percy doesn’t ask how Vax knows. He probably isn’t hiding how brittle he still feels very well.

“Ok.”

Vax nods, looping one arm over Percy’s waist and pressing face into to hollow of his throat. Percy closes his eyes and in the darkness, curls his body around Vax and breaths.


End file.
